Craig Julian Stevens is an Australian former freestyle swimmer specialising in the 400-, 800- and 1500-metre freestyle events. He was an Australian Institute of Sport scholarship holder. Stevens was the bronze medallist in the 1500-metre freestyle event at the 2002 Commonwealth Games, but he narrowly missed out on a medal in the 400-metre freestyle, finishing 4th. In 2004, Stevens made his Olympic Games debut at Athens. There, he won silver as part of the Australian 4×200-metre relay team and also made the final in the 1500-metre. He relinquished his place in the 400-metre freestyle for world record holder Ian Thorpe, who was disqualified in the event at the Australian trials. Stevens was initially left out of the Australian team at the 2006 Commonwealth Games in his home country. However, Ian Thorpe had to withdraw from the games due to illness, which allowed Stevens to take Thorpe's place in the team. After qualifying as the fastest heat swimmer, he again came 4th in the 400-metre freestyle final. He also contested the 1500-metre freestyle final and finished in 6th place. In March 2007, Stevens won his first World Championship medal after finishing 3rd in the 800-metre freestyle final with a personal best time of 7:48.67. After the disqualification of Oussama Mellouli, Stevens was elevated to 2nd. At the same meet, he also broke the 15-minute barrier in the 1500-metre freestyle for the first time, finishing 6th in the final with a time of 14:59.11. Stevens qualified for the Australian Olympic swimming team for the Beijing 2008 Summer Olympics on 29 March 2008 at the Australian Olympic Qualifiers at Homebush in Sydney. He qualified for both the 400-metre and 1500-metre freestyle events. He finished 2nd behind Grant Hackett in the 1500-metre with a personalbest of 14:53.18 making him the third fastest performer by an Australian in history. Stevens failed to qualify for the finals of the 400-metre freestyle at the Olympics as he was comprehensively out-swum, finishing in 8th place in heat three, 7 seconds behind the winner. In the 1500-metre freestyle, Stevens again failed to make the finals finishing 5th in heat four, some 17 seconds behind the winner and 8 seconds outside of his personal best.
